The present invention relates in general to brassieres and, in particular to a new and useful bra construction which includes an underarm comfort feature.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,746,008 discloses a brassiere having a dorsal or underarm panel which comprises two pieces of material which have a stretch characteristic in different directions. The two pieces of material are sewn together in a Y-shaped arrangement. This construction is claimed to avoid the unsightly bulge of tissue above the dorsal panel which sometimes results when the brassiere is unbalanced or overly tight. This patent does not however disclose a structure which is capable of providing a differential expansion between upper and lower margins of the dorsal panel to accommodate women having different proportions in these areas.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,817,255 discloses a brassiere having a dorsal panel with stretchable upper and lower margins. The panel is trapezoidal and has no special supporting structure between the dorsal panel and the cup of the bra.
A side or dorsal panel for a brassiere having crossing tapes is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,464,417. No supporting panel structure is provided above this crossing structure however.
A brassiere with a dorsal panel containing inclined stretch bands is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 2,969,067. A similar structure is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 2,869,554. A further crossing tape construction for a brassiere is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 2,541,960 with a crossing stretch structure in a full body undergarment being disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 2,484,265.
While many of these earlier patents were directed to structures which improve the comfort and wearability of a brassiere or full body undergarment, none of these patents teach a fully satisfactory structure for adapting to different body types in the areas at the top and bottom of the dorsal or underarm panel for a brassiere.